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Obama Ends Major Combat Operations in Iraq
Outside The Beltway | OTB — ... . For the most part, I agree with Christian Brose ’s analysis.  I especially want to emphasize this: Obama can say all he wants that he’s “ending the war” by August 2010, but believing that is nutty, and being surprised that by then we’ll still have 30-50,000 troops in Iraq, as some on the left are, is even nuttier. We knew this was coming. From the moment he said during the campaign that he’d pull all U.S. troops out of Iraq in 16 months, Obama has backtracked — first drawing a false distinction between “combat” and “non-combat” troops, and now pretending that a “residual ...

Obama's Missed Opportunity
Weekly Standard Blog — ... through our Iraq efforts of the past two years. It would have disarmed Obama's more hawkish critics on Iraq by conceding their point on the surge and turning it into an argument for the drawdown, which it is. And it would have shown Republicans that Obama is committed not just to a bipartisanship of style but of substance -- not just being willing to recognize when the other side has valid points, but actually incorporating them into one's own thinking. The whole post is smart. I had some problems with the speech (see Tom Donnelly's comments below) ...

War, and War’s Alarms
Neptunus Lex — ... thanking Camp Lejeune Marines and their families for the sacrifices they have made. Christian Bose, writing for Foreign Policy, says that the president might have gone out on a limb and thanked the man who made success there possible: ...

Christian Brose's Analysis Of Barack Obama's Speech On Iraq
A Chequer-Board of Nights and Days — "Bush probably would have given a very similar speech." Do read the whole thing, of course, but that line was worth highlighting. As is the following: At the risk of heading into la-la land, I think Obama should have tipped his hat ever so slightly today to President Bush, Sen. McCain, and other Republicans who had supported the surge strategy, naming them and thanking them. Of course, there's no telling how Iraq would look today had the surge never happened, but it's likely that conditions would be pretty grim and that this withdrawal plan would have the smell of defeat to it, ...

HOPE AND CHANGE: Obama’s Iraq speech: Brought to you by George W. Bush. I think that magnanimity w…
Instapundit — HOPE AND CHANGE: Obama’s Iraq speech: Brought to you by George W. Bush. I think that magnanimity was never on the menu. ...

Christian Brose’s Analysis Of Barack Obama’s Speech On Iraq
RedState: Conservative News and Community — “Bush probably would have given a very similar speech.” Do read the whole thing, of course, but that line was worth highlighting. As is the following: At the risk of heading into la-la land, I think Obama should have tipped his hat ever so slightly today to President Bush, Sen. McCain, and other Republicans who had supported the surge strategy, naming them and thanking them. Of course, there’s no telling how Iraq would look today had the surge never happened, but it’s likely that conditions would be pretty grim and that this ...

President Obama’s Camp Lejeune Speech was About How to Stay; Not When We’d Leave
Flopping Aces — ... of the surge need to acknowledge that many in the military advocated this drawdown — not least the Service Chiefs, who are worried about the strain on U.S. forces from six years of continuous warfare. But we should all also be worried about committing to this timeline. The problem with establishing timelines rather than objectives is that the enemy accounts for them as well. So, will we really be out of Iraq by 2011? Or is it all a pie-crust promise, easily made and easily broken? 2. This speech should be seen in the context of ...